SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – Seeing Findlay’s Tyler Evans, the man who ended the season for Cal Poly Pomona men’s basketball a year ago, was a little like waving the red flag in front of an angry bull.

The guard from the 2009 NCAA Division II national champions, now graduated, handed out the game ball before the Cal Poly Pomona Elite Eight semifinal against Bentley on Thursday night.

Two hours later, the Broncos were returning to the national championship game after defeating Bentley 71-63 at the MassMutual Center.

Cal Poly Pomona (27-6) will play Indiana (Pa.) University, a 76-70 winner over St. Cloud State, at 10 a.m. Saturday, the winner earning the program’s first men’s basketball national title.

The Broncos closed the first half with an eight-point lead. The Falcons (26-7) tried to fight back and made it a back-and-forth contest, but the match-up zone defense stymied national Player of the Year Jason Westrol.

When Matthew Rosser scored on a breakaway dunk and was fouled with with one minute, two seconds to go, the Broncos began to celebrate.

Now they return to the final, the scene of last year’s gut-wrenching defeat when Evans hit an improbable 3-pointer at the end of the first overtime to give Findlay a 56-53 victory.

“I wonder who set that up, first of all,” senior guard Dahir Nasser, who scored 11 points, said of Evans’ appearance. “That was an interesting way to start the game. Seeing him was all the motivation we needed to get up for since he ended our season last year. But we had enough motivation playing against a great team.”

In the end it came down to the defense of the Broncos, holding Westrol, the National Basketball Coaches Association player of the year, to 15 points on 4-for-16 shooting from the floor.

“We focused on him a lot and didn’t allow him to get going,” Broncos coach Greg Kamansky said. “We made it tough on him to score. He tried to take the game over but we just refused to let him do it. He passed it well and the other guys came through, but not enough.”

Brian Tracey led Bentley with 17 points. He hit some big shots, including four 3-pointers, to keep the Falcons in contention, but there just weren’t enough shots for the Falcons.

“It was very difficult to penetrate their zone,” Westrol said. “They’re a very good help team; they’re long and athletic. We weren’t able to hit some shots tonight.”

John Brandt, who added 11 points for Bentley, echoed Westrol’s words.

“It was a real tough defense, one of the toughest I’ve faced in my career,” Brandt said. “They’re all long, they take away the drive really well, they all help like sharks.”

The Falcons went without a field goal for nearly the final seven minutes of the game, while the Broncos pulled away by scoring inside and out.

“They hit shots from the perimeter more than they usually do,” Bentley coach Jay Lawson said.

Austin Swift had 15 of his game-high 22 points in the second half and was 8 for 10 at the foul line for Cal Poly. Tobias Jahn scored 11 and Mitchel Anderson added 10.